


The Raptor

by ryfkah



Category: Ladyhawke (1985)
Genre: F/M, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-19
Updated: 2015-12-19
Packaged: 2018-05-07 16:18:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5463062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ryfkah/pseuds/ryfkah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On the first night, Isabeau's cousin wouldn't agree to bring the wolf in without the cage. Isabeau is not entirely certain she herself would know what to do with him without the cage.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Raptor

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Thistlerose](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thistlerose/gifts).



It's several hours into the second night. They're standing in the guardshouse, which has been temporarily cleared of guards, and Isabeau's cousin Joanna is railing at her: “Bad enough we've your problem to deal with, Isabeau, but what are we expected to do with _that?_ ”

In his cage, the wolf, Navarre, howls. They wouldn't agree to bring him in last night without the cage. Isabeau is not entirely certain she herself would know what to do with him without the cage. When she first saw the transformation, she'd thought that even as a wolf he might have the mind of a man; now that she has only the faint feathered edges of memory where her day as a hawk should have been, she knows that this cannot be so. The wolf, Navarre, is a wolf. The hawk, Isabeau, is a hawk.

“What else could I do? The Bishop's men would have killed him.”

“Better that way,” says Joanna, harshly. She's not a harsh woman, by nature – or at least, she has always been kind to Isabeau. But then, Isabeau has never before given her any particular reason not to be kind. “What is he? Little more than a common guardsman. Better for you if he were gone and forgotten.”

Isabeau lifts her head to glare at Joanna through eyes that are blurry with tears. The words don't shock her, though she vaguely feels they should – but nothing can be shocking now, perhaps nothing can be shocking ever again. “You shame yourself, cousin.”

“You shame yourself!” Joanna shouts back, and then, belatedly, lowers her voice to a furious hiss. “You lowered yourself. Him, I can hardly blame! A man like that one takes what is offered. But you –” There's real distress in her face, Isabeau realizes, mixed with the anger. “We've not done our duty by you, Isabeau. Have you no idea what it would mean for you, if news of this – this --” Words fail her; she makes a helpless gesture with her hands. “-- of all of this were to spread? What your father would say, if he were to hear of this – what your _mother_ would say –”

Her cousin has reason to fear her mother's displeasure. With the thrones of Naples and Aragon in constant dispute, and the Church fighting for every fingernail of power around the edges, the last thing anyone with a stake in the game wants to do is offend Yolande of Aragon and Anjou.

“What's done is done,” Joanna continues, “but I won't make the same mistake twice.”

Something is climbing up from Isabeau's stomach to her throat, a sob – or no, horribly, it's a laugh. Under the circumstances, she doesn't know what her cousin thinks is possibly going to happen. To be worrying about that now – well, it's funny, isn't it? In an awful sort of way?

She's losing the struggle to keep her mouth still. Usually she's very good at keeping her thoughts locked away, but this curse seems to have unleashed them all for anyone to see. She can't imagine anything less helpful, right now, than letting her cousin see Isabeau laugh at her. Instead, she falls to her knees on the cold stone floor, and buries her treacherous face in her hands.

She must appear suitably guilt-ridden, because when she dares to look up again, Joanna has softened. “We'll keep him the night, anyway,” she says. “Though how any of us will sleep with that howling! – in any case, when morning comes, we'll give him his horse and he can make his way wherever he will, get as far as he can before the curse sets on him again.”

“Through streets crawling with the Bishop's guards, watching for him to emerge from this house?”

“His former fellows, aren't they? They'll lend him a hand. That kind of man, they all stick together. He'll have what he needs to make his way.”

“You have no idea what kind of man he is,” Isabeau whispers, but when Joanna casts a sharp look in her direction, she ducks her head again hastily. “Thank you, cousin,” she murmurs.

“I understand you're frightened, Isabeau,” Joanna says. “We'll take care of you. Your own don't abandon you.”

She holds out a hand to help her up from the floor, and Isabeau accepts. As they walk back to the house, they both carefully avoid looking at the mews just past the stables.

 

**

It's the evening before the first night, and Isabeau doesn't have any idea what's in store for her.

She's contrived an excuse, as she frequently does, to walk out and go to Vespers at the cathedral instead of hearing it with Joanna's household priest. She brings with her Joanna's unmarried sister-in-law Agathe. Agathe manages the estate in Aquila when Joanna and her husband aren't in residence; when they come through on their annual rounds, it's easy for her to find herself feeling extraneous. She's happy for the excuse to go out into the city and complain where Joanna can't hear.

Isabeau doesn't mind Agathe's chatter. Her own mother is busy playing politics on the grand scale. Someday, when she's found an appropriate match for her, she expects that Isabeau will do the same. She's never had the time to introduce Isabeau to the kind of daily responsibilities that Agathe takes for granted – hearing disputes, brewing simples, overseeing supplies.

Isabeau is just starting to realize that her life might look quite different than what anybody expected. It's hard for her to envision a future as Navarre's wife in any more detail than that. She knows Navarre's father was a country knight, who fought in the Holy Land but found no riches there. She knows he has no lordship or he would not be serving as captain of the bishop's guards, but even a guard captain must have some kind of budget that requires some kind of management, some kind of household in need of supervision.

Their private moments together are always so brief, so full forbidden touches and hammering hearts – no human person could be expected to talk about financial planning at such a time. Agathe, leagues above Navarre in social station, is still the closest model that Isabeau has readily available to her. She could listen to her talk all day.

However, Agatha doesn't only talk about household management. She also enjoys gossipping bout the guards. “That one – the dark one. Look at those shoulders on him!”

Isabeau agrees that he has excellent shoulders, and that the English mercenary has very straight teeth, and that the young man third from the right would be much better served if he had a well-fitting surcoat instead of something that must have been handed down from his grandfather.

“But you must admit,” Agathe whispers in her ear, as they enter the cathedral, “none of them can hold a candle to that Captain Navarre.”

“I don't know,” Isabeau answers. “His face to me seems too broad. And look at his forehead, already so high – I'd wager you all that golden hair will be gone before he's forty.”

“Spoilsport,” says Agathe. “It's beautiful _now._ ”

“Also, he's so dour,” says Isabeau. She doesn't bother to lower her voice. “Have you ever seen him smile?”

She shoots a quick glance back at Navarre. She can see very slight creases around his eyes, the only evidence she'll get that he's trying not to laugh. Then his blue gaze meets hers, and the shiver it sends up her spine makes the rest of the world, as always, fall away.

It's only a moment, and then they've passed him and are inside the cathedral to take their place with the others.

Perhaps, she thinks later, if she'd been watching the Bishop sweep in for the service, she'd have noticed something in his face that would have warned her what was to come. But she makes it a point, as she always does, to avert her eyes from the Bishop. He can play his political games with her cousin for control of Aquila if he likes. It's none of her business, and if he looks at her in a way that would make her skin crawl if she could see it – well, she'd rather not see it, that's all.

So she keeps her eyes demurely on her hands throughout the service, and thus she has no warning at all when she steps out of the cathedral to find the entire town in tumult.

“Wolf!” someone cries, and the shout's taken up across the town square: “Wolf! Wolf in the town!” The Bishop's guards are running back and forth, brandishing their swords, but the wild disorder of their movements seems unlikely to accomplish much that's of any use. Isabeau cranes her neck to look for Navarre, who should be leading them, but she can't see him anywhere.

She becomes vaguely aware at this point that Agathe is attempting to tow her back into the safety of the cathedral, but given that Agathe is a full four inches shorter than Isabeau, she's not having much effect.

Several of the guardsmen are still clustered in the cathedral entrance, looking pale and shaken – much more than Isabeau would expect for a simple case of a wolf loose in the city. Isabeau touches the shoulder of the youngest-looking one, and he jumps. “Sir, please – what's happened? Where did this wolf come from? Where's your captain?”

“The captain?” echoes the young guardsman, and begins to laugh. There's a wild note to it. “My lady, the captain's out there!”

He points. Isabeau looks out across the square, and meets the eyes of the wolf. Something – terror? premonition? – shoots up her spine. She can't seem to look away. It feels like it lasts forever, though it must only be a moment before the wolf bounds away into the city.

The Bishop chooses this moment to emerge from the cathedral. He sweeps purposefully through the knot of people clustered in the entrance – pauses, once, to shoot Isabeau a burning glance that makes her shrink back against Agathe – and then addresses himself to the guards.

“Capture the wolf. Alive, if possible. Dead if not. Either way, bring it to me.”

“But sir,” says one of the other guardsmen, “the wolf is --”

“Must I repeat myself?” says the Bishop, coldly.

In that moment, Isabeau understands exactly what's happened – or at least she thinks she does. In truth, she doesn't yet know the half of it.

Still, she's grasped enough to grasp Agathe's hand, lean in close, and whisper in the other woman's ear, “I'm sorry, Agathe! There's no time to be lost!”

Then she pulls out of Agathe's grip, pushes past the Bishop, and starts running back across town, to the chateau that dominates the east side as the cathedral dominates the west. She must tell Joanna what's happened. She must make sure that her cousin's guards capture the wolf before the Bishop's men do, or Navarre's fate cannot be imagined.

**

It's deep into the second night, and Joanna's words keep running through Isabeau's head: your own don't abandon you. Your own take care of you.

Isabeau is grateful to her cousin. Joanna's offer of protection does not come without a cost to herself. There's no proof of the Bishop's wrongdoing, and everything about Isabeau's situation has the potential to become a weapon against her family. Joanna of Naples, when all is said and done, is an honorable woman.

But Isabeau has her honor too.

She waits until past midnight, when the moon is sunk low, and Agathe's breathing in bed next to her is still and slow. Then she collects her jewelry, her embroidery cloths and a bundle of her surcoats which might be sold for the fabric in them, and some coins intended for offerings at the Church next Sunday. She dresses in her plainest gown – not particularly plain – and hides her pinned-up hair under a cloak. At the last minute, she remembers to detour into the kitchens to take a knife.

She's considering the larder when she hears footsteps coming into the kitchen behind her. She whirls around, and sees Agathe.

There is no hiding what Isabeau plans. Agathe frowns at her. “I hoped I was wrong.”

“I'm sorry,” Isabeau whispers. “I must.”

“What do you think you can do for your Captain Navarre out there? You're no guardsman, you can't protect him. All you can do is slow him down, and force him to defend you.”

Isabeau's answer sticks in her throat. It's true, of course, it's all true – what does she know of surviving on her own, of protecting anyone from anything?

But she's the only one who will look at a wolf and see something that must be protected, and surely that counts for something.

“Call to your brother and Joanna, then,” she says, lifting her chin, “and have them keep me prisoner, as the Bishop would do – or stand aside, and let me go. It must be one or the other, Agathe.”

She's never spoken so to Agathe – never spoken so to anyone – but Agathe doesn't seem as shocked as Isabeau had thought she would be. She rubs her eyes, and then looks back up at Isabeau. “Well! God knows you always were as stubborn as a mule --” Now it's Isabeau's turn to look surprised. Agathe manages a dark chuckle. “Did you think you hid it so well? From your cousin, perhaps. One way or another, you seem determined to do yourself an injury, so what's for me to do except let you go to Hell in your own way, and make sure you won't starve on your way there?”

She marches up to the larder and starts sorting through it with brisk efficiency. Unlike Isabeau, she knows exactly what everything in it is, and where to find it. “Here – fresh bread, cheese and apples, an eel pie and half a roasted pheasant – that won't keep, so you eat it quick. Don't you feed it to your wolf! This is for you, Isabeau.”

Isabeau's hands close around the bundle that has materialized in front of her. She blinks at Agathe, suddenly stupid, unable to comprehend the unexpected generosity. “I – thank you, Agathe.”

Agathe turns away. “I pray to God we'll have you back here before the week is out. Don't forget, Isabeau. You have a place to return.”

Isabeau wishes she hadn't said that. It makes the walk through the cold, dark courtyard to the stables all the more difficult. She doesn't have to do this. She can stay in the safety of her cousin's keep – a hawk by day, to be sure, but a woman by night, able to eat and converse and live like a human being for the length of a long winter night. She won't be able to leave, but she could meet guests, and hear their tales of far-off places. She won't be able to marry, but she wouldn't have married anyone other than Navarre in any case, and now at least nobody could possibly expect her to. Many people live with afflictions. For those with wealth and family, many things are still possible.

All this is possible for her, but it is not possible for Navarre, and so she can't turn back.

She can't turn back, even though her heart gives a stuttering jerk of terror when she looks once more on the wolf that is her beloved. He falls silent when he sees her slip into the guardhouse, staring at her through the bars of his cage. Not even his eyes look like Navarre's. Navarre's are blue, like the sky or cornflowers or something out of a minstrel's lay. The wolf's eyes shine with a yellow glint, though that could just be the reflected light of her candle.

She'll never see him in daylight, so she'll probably never know for sure.

She tells herself that he has no reason to harm her. He must realize she's trying to help him. Wolves are said to be intelligent creatures – much brighter than birds. Perhaps there's more room for Navarre's spirit inside the wolf's frame than there is for hers in the hawk's. It might be true.

Before she has time to convince herself otherwise, she leans forward to throw open the latch of the cage.

The wolf flings himself out and past Isabeau in one furious motion, before she even has time to shrink back. Finding the guardhouse door closed, he whirls around, and Isabeau tenses. Trapping herself in a room with a furious wolf is perhaps not the brightest thing she's ever done, but the other option was to risk letting him run straight into the arms of the Bishop's guards, and that she's not willing to do. She stands her ground, her heart rabbiting away in her chest.

“Navarre?” she whispers.

The wolf glares.

Isabeau takes one step forward. The wolf doesn't move. Are its eyes focused on her throat, or her face? Her face, she decides, optimistically – she has plenty of experience in being able to tell when someone is looking lower. Another step, and the wolf doesn't move.

She almost reaches out a hand to him, but her courage fails her at the last. She crouches down instead. Better to at least pretend that he can understand her. A Navarre in his senses would have seen her fear, a Navarre who knew himself would have given her some kind of sign rather than let her continue to be this afraid – but it's better not to think about that. “Navarre,” she says again, trying to ignore how shaky her voice sounds in her own ears. “If we're to escape, we can't go out the front. The Bishop surely has his guards there and will be waiting for you. You must follow me.”

She pushes herself to her feet again, sidles carefully around a stock-still wolf, and opens the door of the barn.

Navarre is through it like a flash.

“God's _thumbs!_ ” swears Isabeau, then claps a hand to her mouth in shame and hastens after him.

At least he hasn't already bounded blithely off into the arms of his hunters. He's paused halfway into the courtyard, hesitating on the verge of a leap. Isabeau can only think of one thing to do. She pulls the roasted pheasant that Yolande gave her out of the satchel and holds it up enticingly.

“Come --” She can't shout; someone will wake up inside the chateau and hear her, or, worse, the night watch outside. She compromises with a kind of desperate hiss. “Navarre, come here!”

His nose lifts up. He sniffs the air. Like a dog, he comes trotting back to her.

Her eyes prickle with tears of embarrassment and shame, for him, for herself, for the fact that they've both come to this: the proudest man in Aquila, and the woman who cannot even pretend to leave him his dignity. She walks quickly backwards, holding the pheasant by the foot. The wolf follows her obligingly. His jaw is slightly open, and he salivates, but he shows no inclination to pounce and tear the pheasant from her hand. He might as well be tame.

If his curse is like hers, he won't remember this. At least that's one thing to be thankful for.

**

It's the first night, deep into the first night; Isabeau has lost track of how long she's been closeted with her cousins, trying to explain why she called the family's private guard out into the city and set them to capturing a wolf alive.

“All right,” Joanna says, with the air of a woman who is holding onto the last of her patience. Her husband stands behind her, stony and silent. Isabeau is his wife's cousin, not his blood, and he'll let Joanna deal with her – but clearly, he's not happy either. “Say that I believe this story that you and Agathe tell me, that the wolf in my stables really is the captain of the Bishop's guard. Say that the Bishop of this city has in fact given his soul entirely over to the devil – and though God knows the man's a walking pustule, that's a harsh accusation to throw at anybody without proof, Isabeau, let alone a father of the church, and let alone the only other person of importance in Aquila! Still, say that all of this is true. What I _still_ do not understand is what all of this has to do with you!”

Isabeau gulps. She's been dancing around this confession for hours now, allowing Agathe to talk herself hoarse of the marvel they saw tonight – but a quick glance in Agathe's direction shows there's no help to be gotten there anymore. Agathe has kept her eyes propped valiantly open as long as she could, but by now she's snoring peacefully away in the corner.

“It's for jealousy of me,” she whispers.

When said aloud, it sounds impossibly vain, even to her own ears. Who is she, that a person like the Bishop of Aquila should imperil his immortal soul for her? She knows she's beautiful, but rumors dance through Aquila every day about the Bishop's dalliances with beautiful women. She understands desire – she herself wanted Navarre the first time she saw him; still, if they'd never spoken together, if she'd never teased him and seen those faint hidden creases at the corner of his eyes, if he'd never kissed her hand and her lips and sworn to love and protect her, she's fairly sure she could have let him go without a second thought, or if not without a second then at least without a third.

She understands desire. She doesn't understand this covetousness, this obsession. It doesn't make any sense. And yet she knows that it's true.

“For jealousy of you,” Joanna echoes, slowly.

Isabeau doesn't know what her cousin is thinking. Her words tumble hastily out, ill-considered and graceless. “God forgive me if I'm wrong – I pray to God I am wrong – but I believe the Bishop is punishing Navarre for jealousy of me, because – because Navarre and I --”

She's watching Joanna's impassive face, and straining to see what lies behind it. She's not looking out the window. She's not watching the sun rise slowly over the horizon.

“Navarre and I,” she tries again, but abruptly her voice is no longer hers to command and the last word turns into a harsh cry that hangs in the air. Her throat feels wrong, her skin feels wrong, the ground is falling away under her feet –

– and then for a while everything is very bright and foggy and angry, very angry –

– and she's under a blanket, and she's shivering, and the last light outside the window is fading away.

She pulls her head free of the blanket, pulling it tightly around herself. The first thing she sees is Agathe, who quietly holds out a chemise and an overgown. Isabeau reaches out a trembling hand to take them. She's in her own chamber. Everything is as it should be, and nothing is as it should be, nothing at all.

“What --”

“A hawk,” says Agathe. Her voice is shaking, too. “You were a hawk.”

“A...” She can't imagine it. Hawks are fierce birds, hunting birds. They draw blood even from their owners. She's always been afraid to touch them. “But --” She looks down at her arm, her own pale arm, with a hand and five fingers at the end of it. Her heart gives a sudden leap in her chest. “But then if I was – and I'm no longer – then the curse is broken? Navarre –”

“Oh, Isabeau,” sighs Agathe, sorrowful and exasperated all at once, and pulls her into an sudden embrace, gown and undergown and blanket and all.

It's warmer in Agathe's arms. All the same, Isabeau feels her blood running cold. “Tell me,” she whispers, into Agathe's ear. “Just tell me.”

Agathe steps back and scowls at her. “Put your clothes on,” she says, with an attempt at her usual briskness. “You'll catch your death.” As Isabeau obediently pulls the chemise over her head, she said, “Captain Navarre became a man again at dawn, just as you turned to a hawk. Joanna had her useless hanger-on of a household priest praying over you all day before he had to go say Vespers. Isabeau!” she cautions, as Isabeau's head pops through the head of the chemise, eyes afire. “There's something strange about this. Don't --”

“Where is he?” Isabeau dives into her overdress. Why is it always harder to find the sleeves when one is in a hurry? “Agathe, tell me, quick!”

“In the stables – in the cage he was brought in. He never left it. He fears that the curse still hangs on him, and I believe he is right. Isabeau, wait --”

But Isabeau's already running out the door, struggling with her laces as she runs down the stairs. The curse didn't last, and Navarre's all right, it's all going to be all right –

She runs barefoot and half-laced out into the courtyard, flies straight to the stables, throws the door open, and practically runs straight into her cousin Joanna, who is staring, grim-faced, at a cage that holds a wolf.

**

As the second night drags on, there's one more thing to be thankful for: miraculously, nobody hears her coaxing the wolf that is Navarre across the courtyard and into the cellars of the chateau.

She is almost certain the Bishop knows nothing of this way in and out of the chateau. None of the city officials do, on account of the fact that the city levies a heavy tax on imported wines, which Agathe has decided it is her right not to pay. The wolf Navarre noses with great interest around the various barrels and bottles, and she has to drop several pieces of pheasant in his path to get him to continue to move in the right direction.

The smuggler's tunnel extends for a good league behind the chateau before opening out again into the forest outside the city walls. She's never walked its full length before; there's never been a need. Their walk to the surface can't take more than an hour, but it feels like years, especially with the deadline hanging over her head. When the sun rises...

When the sun rises, Navarre will be a man. He'll be confused, but he'll let no harm come to the bird, if the bird has enough sense to stay with him. Of that she's certain. Still, it doesn't make her feel any better about the inevitability of losing herself again so soon.

But when she emerges, it's still safely dark. The moon and stars shine obscurely above through the heavy canopy of the forest. Isabeau supposes she had better get used to the sight.

It's only been two days. It's ridiculous to start missing the light of the sun so soon.

She ought to keep walking, get them both as far away from Aquila as possible before the dawn breaks and spreads the word to the Bishop that his prey has fled. In a moment she will, but she's tired and heart-sick. She sits herself down on a rotting log and stares across at the wolf.

She's not afraid of the wolf anymore, not really. She almost wishes she was. It would be better than this awful pity she feels when looking at him as he is now.

She'd enjoyed being a little bit afraid of Navarre, when they'd first exchanged glances outside the walls of the cathedral. She'd liked that she felt bold and daring when she approached him, the big solemn knight with the craggy face that looked as if it never smiled. He'd seemed to her like a dangerous man, kept civilized by will alone – and if his will was as strong as he meant it to be, he would never have let her pull him away to walk with her alone. He wouldn't have folded her hand in his arm, nor kissed it, before they parted ways again, with a suppressed passion that spoke volumes more than he had said in words.

Remembering is a mistake. She draws her knees up, on the stump, and buries her head in her hands. This is foolish, and she doesn't have time for it, but she can't help herself: she sits there and weeps, for everything that's happened, and for everything that's yet to come. It will be the one time, she tells herself. The one time she allows.

When the tears have subsided, she dashes them out of her eyes and looks over at the wolf, who has curled himself peacefully up on the forest floor to take a nap. He cracks one eye open when he hears her moving.

“It won't happen again,” she tells him, firmly. “From now on, I'll protect you. I'll be fierce as the hunting bird he's made me.”

She's hoping the brave words will make her feel better. In truth, what she's really hoping for, once again, is some sign from the wolf – some indication that Navarre is in there, that he can understand her. But whatever she's looking for, he doesn't provide it.

They walk on. She doesn't have a goal or a direction in mind, except 'away.' She doesn't know how far they get before she starts to see a glimmer on the horizon – no sun, not yet, but a dawning haze where the sun is about to be.

“All right,” she says, out loud, and looks at the wolf. “All right,” she says again, and rubs her weary eyes with her fists, while she still has them. “It's up to you now for a while.”

She means to look away. She means to leave them both their dignity, as much as she's able, but she finds herself staring at the wolf instead. If she can catch a glimpse of Navarre, the real Navarre, even for a moment, she'll be able to make it through. She'll remember why she's doing this.

And for a moment, she thinks she almost might. For a moment, she can almost see him, solid and golden and human –

– but before she can make out more than the barest impression, it all fades into the red haze of the bird's anger. By the time her mind comes back to her, there's nothing for her to hold onto at all, except the vaguest outlines of a man who might as well be a fantasy.

She wants to weep, but she's promised herself, and the wolf, that she won't waste any more time on that.

She doesn't recognize the room she finds herself in – that's good. She's not back home, nor in the cathedral. Nor is she stowed away in a mews or fighting her way out of a cage, as she might be if someone had mistaken her for a true hawk. Instead, she seems to be in some kind of small cottage. There's no one else there, but a fresh-stoked fire burns in the hearth, giving her enough light to see that her gowns are laid carefully over the top of a trunk in the corner that serves as the only piece of furniture besides the pallet she's lying on.

This is all good news. It seems that nobody's captured them during the time that she missed, and that Navarre was here and in his right mind – for who else would have known to leave clothing out for a hawk? Still, the fact that she doesn't see a wolf in the cottage with her is unnerving. Where is he, and why has he left her alone?

As she's dressing herself, it occurs to her to wonder if perhaps Navarre has left her any kind of message. She looks around the small cottage, but finds nothing. Perhaps he couldn't find parchment, or anything to write with. Or perhaps he doesn't know that she knows how to read. She can't recall if they've discussed it, and Navarre might not expect it.

She can't recall, she realizes abruptly, if Navarre knows how to write.

Once she's clothed, she goes to the door to look out and see if she can spot the wolf. Instead, she sees the outline of a man in a guardsman's uniform, facing away from her. He turns when he hears her emerge. He's holding a torch, and the flickering light of it illuminates his face.

Her heart, which had been in the process of leaping, sinks down again to its new permanent location around her toes. Dully, she wonders how long it's going to take her to stop expecting that everything will somehow have fixed itself while she's gone.

The guard coughs, and holds the torch up higher. “My lady Isabeau.”

His face is familiar. Isabeau frantically attempts to remember his name. “Francesco,” she says, after a moment, with some relief – both at the fact that it hasn't taken her longer, and that it gives her something to say at all.

“The captain said --”

Isabeau has had a great deal of practice controlling her face when the subject of Navarre comes up. She does her best now, but under the circumstances she thinks she can be forgiven a little less control than usual. “You spoke to Navarre? Sir, please – where is he? Is he well?”

“He's –” Francesco jerks his head towards the woods. “He's left, my lady. Before – He said to tell you --” He stops, looking desperately embarrassed.

Isabeau manages to smile faintly at this. “Something disapproving, I suppose.”

“He doesn't think it was wise for you to escape with him, my lady,” says Francesco, tactfully. “He's concerned for your safety. I must say I agree with him.”

Since she's never actually spoken with Francesco before tonight, Isabeau doesn't consider his opinion particularly relevant. She attempts not to show this on her face, as Francesco goes on,“He asked me to bring you back with him.”

It's not unexpected. Of course he would ask this. She's startled by how angry it makes her. “It's kind of you to offer, sir, but hard of him to ask it of you – and of me.”

“My lady?”

“What does he think is going to happen if I walk back into the city with you? Does he think the Bishop will allow us to reach the safety of my cousin's estate without attempting to intervene? Does he think, after what's happened, that there's any kind of guarantee my cousin's house can offer a haven at all?” She hears her own voice getting louder, and tamps it down to a kind of furious hiss. Unlike many of her relatives – her mother, for example – she's never had difficulty with patience or control; she'd always thought she was natively sweet-natured, that there simply not very much anger in her to bestow. It turns out this is not the case. It turns out that the right pressures, like a shaking of the earth, can open up a placid meadow and unleash a torrent. “And does he think I will allow him to sacrifice himself, to run off into the forest and – and hunt mice and rabbits and never be seen again? Does he think I could live happily, knowing he was suffering? He made a vow to remain by my side! And you may tell him, from me, that I don't intend to allow him to break it!”

“Well,” says Francesco, looking more uncomfortable than ever, “no, I – I can't, because I must return to the city before the Bishop suspects me, and I won't be back here when – well, when, you know.”

Isabeau takes a deep breath, and then another. Her anger ebbs. It's not Francesco's fault. It's not Navarre's fault, either. He wants to protect her.

She wishes that he could.

As gently as she can, she says, “Yes, of course. But you must see I can't go with you.”

“You might,” says Francesco, but she can see in his face that he's already admitted defeat.

“I'm grateful that you stayed this long. I know you must return, and I won't keep you, but before you go – if you've the time – would you tell me what else passed between you and Navarre this day?”

“We didn't have much chance to speak, the day being so short.” Francesco sounds regretful. It makes her feel more kindly towards him. “He sent a village boy to find me – told me to bring him his clothes, his horse, his armor and his sword; take the money to reward the boy from his own purse, and the rest for me. Well, that took me some time, the sword having been taken into custody by the guards after all that business the other night when he first – when the curse – well, you know.” He grins, suddenly. “Once I found him, I told him that if he was going to insult me, he was lucky I'd shown up at all. All his coin's over there, with his sword, and the clothes.” He nods in the direction of a neat bundle tucked away in a corner of the shed.

Isabeau follows his gaze. Something that's been nagging at the back of her mind surges abruptly to the forefront, and she feels her face go hot with embarrassment. “His clothes?” Had she really forgotten –

At that, Francesco does laugh. “When I got here, the poor man was still naked as the day he was born! Too damn honorable to even steal a shirt from a washing-line. How he got the peasant lad to think him anything but a madman, I don't know. I swear only the captain could have done it. And him with his poor arm all torn up, too, from carrying the hawk about without a glove --”

He must see something in her face, because he breaks off hastily. Now it's his turn to flush. “Pardon me, my lady – the captain, he always says I talk too much. But,” he adds, hastily, “don't think I'll betray where you're hiding. He knows I never would.”

Isabeau swallows. “Yes, of course. Sir – his arm. Is it very bad?”

“Nothing to a campaigner like Navarre, my lady. He'll heal up quick.”

There's a small silence. Isabeau searches for a way to be gracious, for the right and courteous words to offer in a situation such as this – though grace and courtesy, right now, seem a very long way away. She takes a breath, squares her shoulders and meets his gaze squarely. “I don't know how to thank you for what you've done this day. If we are to survive, it's because of your service. We owe you our lives.” A thought abruptly occurs to her. “If you think the Bishop is likely to discover what you've done, and punish you for your kindness to us, you may ask my cousin for employ – she would be happy to take a good man of Aquila into her own guard, and all the more if she knew that you had helped me.”

“That's kind of you, my lady,” says Francesco, looking rather startled, “but it's not necessary. It's my day on leave, and His Holiness has got no reason to know I'm here.” He hesitates. “Are you sure --”

“Yes,” says Isabeau, more firmly than she feels. “I'm sure. I belong here, with him.” Even though he's not here, but roaming out somewhere, far away from her. Even though she can't see him, can't hear him, can't talk to him, can't touch him – except, perhaps, with her talons, lashing out savagely in ways she can't remember.

And Francesco is _still_ standing there, awkward and well-meaning, and with no help to offer except the kind that she's already decided to reject. “You should go,” she tells him. “It's late. You need to return. You should go.”

Francesco gives her one last look, and then his shoulders slump – with relief, Isabeau suspects, as well as resignation. He's discharged his duty to Navarre. She isn't his problem anymore. He's probably just as glad of that.

He bows, and then he turns on his heel, and, finally, goes.

And now she's alone.

Really alone. She can't remember the last time that was true, except for fleeting moments when slipping out of the castle for an assignation. Even then, she'd been constantly aware of all the people around her, never more than a shout away. That hadn't been solitude, not really.

Even last night, she'd had the wolf padding along beside her. She'd almost despaired in her loneliness then, but right now it doesn't seem so bad. At least it had been a reminder of what she was doing this for.

Still, she'd made a promise. She'd told Navarre that she would protect him. She'd said it out loud. She'd sworn it.

The long, empty night stretches before her.

For lack of anything better to do, she goes over to the folded pile of belongings that Francesco left behind, kneels down, and begins to take stock of their assets. Some coin – enough to feed them for a few weeks, probably, unless Navarre has to bribe anybody else, which doesn't seem unlikely. Navarre's clothes, which can't be sold, and his sword, likewise.

And some more things that Francesco must have brought at Navarre's request, though he hadn't mentioned them: a falconer's glove. A padded shoulder-rest. A set of jesses.

It takes an effort to unclench her fingers from around the glove. There's no hiding from it: she's becoming a thing that can wound. There's a part of her that even relishes the idea. Given the opportunity, a sharp-taloned bird could fly at the Bishop. She could dig her claws into his scalp until the blood poured down his face. She could rip the eyes from his head.

Yesterday, the thought would have horrified her. Today, it frightens her how easily it comes. What will happen to her tomorrow, and the day after that, and the day after that?

Is she still carrying the hawk's anger, or did the Bishop choose the hawk because he somehow saw in her an anger that she never knew was there?

She sets the glove down, carefully, and returns her attention to the things that she brought with her: the food, the kitchen knife, the gowns and bedclothes. She picks up the knife, and then sets it quickly down again. Instead, she turns her attention to the bedclothes, Agathe's chatter about the rising price of good cloth running through her mind. She brought them for a reason. If they could find somewhere with a marketplace that wasn't Aquila, they ought to be able to sell them or exchange them for a decent price.

She looks down at the dress that she's wearing. The fine embroidery stitching on the bodice glimmers in the firelight. She doesn't need a gown like this. In fact, she needs the opposite of this. Something inconspicuous, that won't mark her as a fine lady. Perhaps even something that won't mark her as a woman at all.

Would Navarre think to sell her gowns? Would his honor even allow him to do so?

What she has are the things she knows, and the things she can learn – but first, now, the things she knows. And she'd always known she would someday have to manage a budget.

There's no parchment, of course, and no ink. She looks briefly back at the kitchen knife – but there's no need to go to the extremes of writing in blood when there's a poker right there. She frowns down at the floor, chewing on her lip. What language? They've always spoken together in the French of her native Anjou, but his employment has been in Italy, and Latin is the most concise. In the end, she decides on French, mostly because it feels more like speaking to him, which provides her with at least a little comfort.

The message, of necessity, is short:

 _Sell my clothes. Buy cheap ones for me, and paper._  
_I love you._  
_Isabeau_

She clambers to her feet, poker in hand, and surveys what she's written. The letters are shaky. Her hand's not steady at the best of times – she's used to having scribes write for her, whenever she's needed to write – and it's made worse by the necessity of trying to carve out words in the dirt with a poker. Perhaps he won't be able to understand.

If not, she'll find another way. She kneels down into the ground once more and writes one last message in the dirt:

_We will survive._

**Author's Note:**

> Oh, man. Historical context, what historical context? I ended up going with Isabeau as another daughter of the 15th-century [Yolande of Aragon and Anjou](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yolande_of_Aragon), who besides all her more famous children had at least one daughter whose name we don't know, so one can at least imagine she might have also had another who disappeared from the books. It also gives Isabeau's family the hereditary tie to Naples, where the actual Aquila is ('so why is everyone in the film apparently French' 'I DON'T KNOW, LOOK, THERE'S A CHARACTER CALLED FRANCESCO WHICH IS AN ITALIAN NAME, RIGHT'). Cousin Joanna, however, is a total fiction. Thanks for giving me the opportunity to flail around attempting to historicize this ridiculous, delightful movie! :)


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